[2012 trends] To fret or not to fret?

On top of that, advertising revenue is bound to be tepid this year because of economic downturn.

The long and the short of it is that 2012 is a year of reining in spending for all so we can expect marginal media products to be shut, retrenchments and other forms of cost-cutting.

But it's not all gloomy as I peer into the crystal ball so let's look first at the sunnier spots for SA media this year, wherein lies opportunity for the smart operators:

1. It's going to be a great year for news.

   On the sport front, there is the London Olympics while business media anywhere in the world can go to town on analysing the fascinating global economic situation.

   In South Africa, it is the year of Politics with a capital "P". The power struggles within the ANC and the tripartite alliance leading up to the party's December elective conference in Mangaung are epic. This may not be simply a battle for the ANC presidency but a battle for the soul of the party and whether it should chart a course for more leftist waters. Fascinating stuff!

2. Power struggle

   As we saw in the battle between former president Thabo Mbeki and president Jacob Zuma, political power struggles tend to stir up the dirt so we can expect revelations of corruption, personal scandal and maladministration this year as the players seek to oust each other from the battle field.

   Most top ANC people are up to their armpits in arms-deal verneukery anyway, so there's plenty of dirt to fling around. My guess is that the revelations about the president's spokesman Mac Maharaj late last year was leaked to the media from a Zuma rival - possibly the ANC Youth League that was slapped down so publicly. The Sunday papers and the Mail & Guardian can capitalise on these dynamics in a big way.

3. The other kind of power struggle

   Another big story to watch unfold is SA's billion-rand nuclear-power expansion (we will be building up to six nuclear stations before 2030). Megabuck construction projects such as these - with myriad government tenders, complex supply chains and foreign money - lend themselves to corruption and kickbacks.

   Watch this space as it's going to get very interesting and the SA firm Aveng, led by Roger Jardine (formerly CEO of media company Kagiso), is a prime contender at the lucrative trough.

4. Circulation
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   Talking of the M&G, it will be very interesting to see if it can sustain its circulation growth of last year, built mostly on investing in quality people and kick-ass content. I hope so.

   While it goes without saying that most SA papers will continue to be squeezed on both sides by declining circulation and depressed advertising revenue, we can expect to see some of Media24's titles arrest circulation decline now that the company has largely fixed its terrible problems with the Cycad CRM system.

   Beeld in Gauteng, for instance, was showing an increase in the last available ABCs (for the third quarter of 2011) and I hear that the Daily Sun, the big daddy of SA's tabloids, should show an arrest in circulation decline in the ABC numbers for the last quarter of 2011.

5. City Press the one to watch
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   Also at Media24, SA's biggest media company, City Press is the one to watch as its highly regarded editor, Ferial Haffajee (@ferialhaffajee), has reached that sweet spot where anyone who's hot and happening wants to work in her newsroom.

   Success breeds success, so I've noted with interest that Haffajee has been bagging some excellent journos over the past year: Mandy Rossouw (@MandyRossouw) and Yolandi Groenewald (@YolandiG) (both from the M&G), Carien du Plessis (@carienduplessis) (from Daily Maverick) and early this year Natasha Joseph (@TashJoeZA) (from the Cape Argus) will join as news editor.

   Behind the scenes, market-research whizz Jos Kuper (who worked closely with the late Deon du Plessis on the Daily Sun for many years) is working her magic at understanding the paper's market, so I think there are many more good things to come from City Press.

6. New broom for Media24 Newspapers

   In fact, Media24's entire newspaper division is about to get a new broom in Fergus Sampson, when he takes over from Abraham van Zyl as head of newspapers in the first quarter of this year.

   Sampson, who is CEO of the English newspapers (Daily Sun and City Press) at the moment, will be adding the Afrikaans papers (Beeld, Die Burger, Volksblad and Rapport) to his stable.

   A big job, but I'm sure he's up to it, as the grapevine says Sampson is a results-man and not to be trifled with.

7. Avusa's possibly poisoned chalice

   While on corporate movers and shakers, the announcement of a new Avusa CEO (to replace Prakash Desai) will be interesting. The word is that acting CEO Mike Robertson, previously Sunday Times editor, is not in line for the job and the board is looking outside the company.

   The question is: who would want the job? Given that Avusa is knee-deep in legacy businesses and it's hard to read its noxious boardroom politics, it might well be a poisoned chalice.

8. New news editor for The New Age

   It will also be interesting to see if The New Age can keep up the tempo, now that veteran news editor Raymond Joseph (@rayjoe) has handed over the reins of the paper's news desk.

   It was an inspired move by The New Age editor Ryland Fisher (@rylandfisher) to lure Joseph from Cape Town to Joburg to run his news desk last year but where to now for the one-year-old paper?

   Newspapers live and die on the shoulders of their news editors but I've heard positive things about Joseph's successor, Terry van der Walt, who was tabloid training manager at the Daily Sun.

9. Closing down and/or repositioning

   On the delicate issue of products falling by the wayside this year, we can probably expect some of the more marginal magazines in competitive categories such as décor and women's general interest to be axed.

   And I wouldn't be at all surprised if Independent Newspapers repositions its two afternoon papers - the Daily News in Durban and the Cape Argus in Cape Town - and makes them morning papers or closes them down. Afternoon papers across the world have been in trouble for quite some time and a depressed economy makes tough decisions a necessity - especially at Independent Newspapers, where its Irish owners are ruthless about profit margins.

10. Up its game
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    The country's first iPad-only newspaper, iMaverick, will have to lift its game in terms of subscribers if it is to grow but the company's CEO, Styli Charalambous (@StyliChara), told me late last year that he hopes to seal a couple of corporate deals soon that will boost the numbers substantially. I do hope they pull it off.

    My guess is the deals are with blue-chip outfits such as financial services firms who want to give iPads to their top people. Maverick's overheads are so low compared with traditional-media houses that one or two deals such as these will be just the ticket for founder Branko Brkic (@brankobrkic) and his enterprising crew.

11. News-reading habits

    And then, Twitter is becoming so ubiquitous within media circles and beyond, that it really is worth noting the seismic shift of social networking - and that most of us now get our news headlines off Twitter feeds (and not newspapers) and read articles recommended by our Twitter and Facebook buddies.

    We're all reading far more widely and eclectically. Loyalty to any particular title is over.

12. E-readers

    Likewise, more and more people are getting tablets and e-readers, whether they be iPads, Kindles or Kindle Fires. My hairdresser has a Kindle, for heaven's sake, and the other day in a suburban doctor's office, I sat next to a 60-something woman noodling away on a tablet.

    The tech keeps getting smarter and cheaper faster and faster, so beware those who think that the feel of ink on paper will bear out in the end. There's no going back for media consumers on this one.

For more:

• Bizcommunity: Media awards 2011: Rock(y) and roll, December 2011, by Gill Moodie
  
• Clay Shirky: Newspapers, Paywalls, and Core Users, January 2012